


Selfish

by Chellodello



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Canonical Character Death, M/M, Possibly Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-04
Updated: 2014-01-04
Packaged: 2018-01-07 10:00:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,330
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1118552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chellodello/pseuds/Chellodello
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Marco isn't a selfish person by nature but sometimes he wishes he was.<br/>Or;<br/>Marco loves Jean. Jean loves Mikasa. Ymir watches the fallout.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Selfish

**Author's Note:**

> I was upset so I figured it might be a good time to write a more likely version of how jeanmarco would have went in canon.

 

 

 

_ I wish you had a favorite beauty spot that you loved secretly because it was on a hidden bit that nobody else could see. Basically, I wish that you loved me... _

-Nicest Thing Kate Nash

* * *

 

Marco isn’t a selfish person by nature, giving has always come easy for him: his time, his ear, his support. He gives it all away without a second thought not because he thinks he should but because it’s just the way he is.

Wanting something just for himself and only himself was a foreign and disconcerting feeling. He didn’t like it all that much, it felt heavy in his stomach, it made him feel like he was doing something wrong. Because Marco Bodt wasn’t selfish.

But sometimes he wants to be.

“You’ve got to be some kind of saint or something freckles.” Ymir comments dryly, picking up on him starting at Jean while he stared at Mikasa. He hadn’t thought he’d been obvious and he probably wasn’t. Ymir just noticed things about people, things that nobody else could see. “Marco Bodt: patron saint of selfless love. What a load of shit.” She sits down next to him, ignoring her usual seat: glued to Christa’s side.

Marco looks at his lap instead of at Jean, a blush creeping on his cheeks. “He likes Mikasa.”

“News flash; everyone likes Miss Crazy.”

That doesn’t make him feel better surprisingly. Marco knows he is no Mikasa, he’s okay with that. He wishes no ill-will on the object of Jean’s affections; Mikasa was always decent enough to him. Marco just wants Jean to look at him the way that he looks at her.

While he isn’t as exotic as their classmate there are plenty of little things to discover about him, if only Jean were willing to look. Places that he was ticklish, patches of freckles that hardly saw the light of day, smiles that he would only smile for him.

Marco wants Jean to look at him like he couldn’t quite understand him, but wanted to keep trying. He wants to hold Jean’s hand when no one else was looking. After a rough day of training he wants to reassure Jean with his kisses that they were strong enough to make it to the military police. Together. He wants to be the first and last thing Jean thinks of when he sleeps. He wants Jean to need him. Marco wants Jean to love him the way that he loves him; all encompassing, selfishly, completely.

 It feels irresponsible and ridiculous even to him, but he can’t help himself from feeling it. They lived in a world where they could die at any time and he was jealous of a girl who had never done anything to him, who would sooner hold a tea party with Shadis before she returned Jean’s feelings.

The freckled teen feels like scum and the bread from dinner is tasteless in his mouth, the guilt of daring to be so presumptuous is the cause.

 “He’s as dumb as rocks, he’ll never know unless you tell him.” Ymir notes casually, stealing his loaf frm his hands. He lets her.

Ymir is trying to help in her own way he supposes and it's not as if she is wrong. It will never occur to the ash haired boy that he liked him as anything other than his best friend if he said nothing. Jean always has a hard time knowing how to interpret positive feelings sent his way, not being used to receiving them. If Marco wanted any chance of having those things, the hand holding, the ticklish touches, the dream murmurings, just Jean: then he’d have to tell him first.

But he won’t, he can’t. He can’t risk losing the boy as his friend over something as selfish as his heart. Marco wants to spent the rest of his life by Jean’s side in any capacity he would allow; even if it wasn’t the way he yearned for.

Marco flashes Ymir what hopes is an encouraging smile. It isn’t. “It’s probably better he doesn’t know.”

The freckled girl shrugs and picks up her tray, presumably to go back to her regular seat. “Be a martyr then.” Her voice holds a bit of annoyance to it, as if this was an old topic of irritation for her. Marco can’t fathom why she cares about this, about him and his feelings at all, they weren't close.

He wants to yell at her retreating back that he wasn't being a martyr, it wasn’t like that, but he doesn’t because Jean has turned back to him and is complaining about something Eren did. So Marco smiles and listens, he always listens, as Jean goes on and on like a brat and does his best to ignore his heart that calls out for him.

Marco Bodt isn’t selfish, he’ll never just take what he wants. It’s not who he is.

He wishes it was sometimes.

* * *

 

Standing in front of the last burning embers of the funeral pyre, Jean watches as the remains of his best friend, his only friend, go up in smoke with the nameless masses. Most of the others have left by now, too tired and burdened to stay and watch to the end like him.

Jean’s mind is running a mile a minute, firing thoughts back and forth with a speed that leaves him dizzy. Things that he has seen, things he wishes he hadn’t, dreams gone by and lost in the ruins of Trost, futures he planned that are now lost and the present that he has to try and figure out now.

Incredibly one of those thoughts, seemingly out of nowhere, is that he never held Marco’s hand before.

He doesn’t know why this sudden desire to hold Marco’s hand pops up. It was probably rough and calloused like his, completely unappealing, not the subject of fantasizing about for sure. But now that it is denied to him forever Jean yearns for it like burning, feels like he has missed out on something important.

Someone lays a hand on his shoulder. He catches a brief glimpse of dark hair and freckles and almost believes it's all a giant cruel mistak: that Marco is alive.

It isn't ofc ourse, it’s just Ymir.

Jean wilts under her palm.

“Go back to the barracks Jean.” She commands in an icy, even for her, tone. She’s mad at him but he can’t fathom why, whats more is that he doesn't have the energy to really care about whatever crawled up Ymir's butt and died. The pyre is nothing but billowing smoke now, tunneling into the sky in thick wisps and clouds. He can’t even gather enough venom to tell her to shove off, so he wordlessly nods and turns to leave.

“He loved you, you know.” She says quite suddenly. Jean tenses and clutches the shard of bone in his hand so hard it breaks the skin. It doesn’t hurt as much as her words. “A lot of good that did him.”

Jean has a hard time breathing, but he wills his feet to move, to carry him away from the pyre and Ymir and her horrible words.

He keeps thinking about it as he lays in bed, willing the darkness to come over him and give him some respite from this horrible day: horrible life. How long had Marco felt that way, why didn’t say anything? Sure he liked Mikasa but maybe if he had known—

_Then what?_

Jean doesn’t know what but he wants it, he wants that possibly, the chance to have figured out if they could have been- well, if they cold have been. It’s a horrible selfish thing; to want things from the dead, but Jean is a selfish person by nature and so he wants none the less.

Mostly he just wants Marco back.

* * *

 

Marco is the first and last thing on Jean's mind when he finally goes to sleep; just like he always wanted.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Selfish [PODFIC]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4620897) by [Chellodello](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chellodello/pseuds/Chellodello), [glasvegi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/glasvegi/pseuds/glasvegi)




End file.
